The Way We Weren't
by Kellifer
Summary: She was trying to appeal to his better nature, his sense of pride. John was sorry to break it to her but he was severely lacking in both those things.
1. Beginning

"I have to think about it."

He'd meant it. He really had. 

Antarctica was a place he'd been posted because of insubordination. He knew he was never going to ascend through the ranks any higher than Major and really, his life had pretty much stopped in a snowy wasteland, ferrying scientists and more important military personnel than himself to a base in the middle of nowhere that he wasn't allowed to know anything about.

He'd said his goodbyes to his few acquaintances, packed his bags and had headed to the SGC. He had ducked out of the Officers meeting not because of any real reason other than the need to piss off his commanding officer from the get go, just so there would no illusions later on.

He had endured the many physicals and the way scientists would look at him with grudging annoyance when his IQ tested way higher than they thought it deserved to.

He'd been packed, his shoes tied, uniform on and a DVD of his favourite football game secreted inside his jacket, close to his heart.

He'd actually been on his way to the 'gate room when the siren had gone off like he was supposed to. As he'd walked he'd spotted the silver haired General who had talked him into this crazy stunt and he'd automatically ducked into a side room as if he should be ashamed of something.

When he emerged, he had walked in the opposite direction and had ended up in the SGC cafeteria, not really sure how he'd gotten there or why.

The pretty but severe looking brunette who had pressed for his inclusion had found him only a few minutes later.

"Major Sheppard?" She'd prompted, looking at him with more than a little concern, obviously wondering just why on earth he was sitting in a cafeteria when he should be standing at the bottom of the ramp leading up to another world.

"I thought I could do this." He said, waving a hand in a helpless gesture. "Turns out, not so much."

She slid in to the seat opposite him and dropped a hand onto her chin, regarding him with serious eyes. "We have had a few last minute changes of heart, but I must admit, I didn't expect one of them to be you." She said. Her mouth turned down at the corners and he realized that he had never seen her smile and that he wanted to.

"You've read my record. I tend to be flaky." He said, more than a little self-deprecation in his tone. She huffed in annoyance.

"I know how to read a service record and see what's not written down," she said and he looked at her, noting that he liked the way her hair was messy on purpose.

"Did you see the word 'loser' stamped on it?" He asked, arching an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure it's not specifically written but it's definitely implied." 

"Major – "

"You're going to another Galaxy. I guess I haven't gotten my head around that concept. The whole one-way-trip possibility is also putting a dampener on my enthusiasm." His voice was low and although there were other people in the room, Elizabeth didn't lean forward to make their conversation more intimate like he hoped. Instead, she leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest and he realized that he would have been strangely disappointed in her if she had gone the other way.

"_We're_ going to another Galaxy. I had to pull a lot of strings and promise a lot of favours to get you included. Don't make me have done that for nothing. Don't prove those men right."

She was trying to appeal to his better nature, his sense of pride. John was sorry to break it to her but he was severely lacking in both those things.

"You have a 'gate to catch." He said, slouching down further in his chair to put physical emphasis on his decision.

She didn't argue with him.

She didn't judge him.

She merely stood and placed the chair she had displaced neatly back underneath the table. 

"I'm disappointed," she said, her tone clipped.

She turned on her heel and left him behind.

He almost followed her.

Almost


	2. Middle

It had been twelve months to the day when John had come home to SFs standing on his doorstep, looking somber and all too serious. He brushed passed them on his way into his house and had turned, indicating they should follow.

"Get you boys a beer?" John had offered and both had looked a little taken aback, as if they hadn't been expecting him to be friendly. John liked to throw people off from the start.

"Major John Sheppard." The taller of the two had intoned and John had quirked an eyebrow.

"I'm not in the service anymore. Has someone been telling you lies?" He had asked, not bothering to wait for an answer to his previous question and only retrieving from his kitchen a beer for himself. He had stood in the kitchen doorway facing the lounge room, shoulder against the jamb, watching the two men stand awkwardly in the middle of the room, not really knowing what to do with themselves.

The shorter, a man with pale skin and an unfortunate complexion cleared his throat. "You've been recalled to active duty. You country needs you."

John had grunted. "Figured. You don't call, you don't write, unless you need something."

He'd known protesting would be a waste of time and he had to admit that he'd been curious as hell. He'd made the two men wait until he finished his beer before he would let them escort him to where they wanted to go, and wasn't surprised when they told him to pack a bag because he was heading to Colorado.

Cheyenne Mountain hadn't changed much in the intervening time. There was a new General and John was sad to see it, hating to admit to himself that he had been looking forward to seeing O'Neill. The bespectacled archeologist was still around and had stopped in to say hello and make small talk.

Finally John was in the briefing room again and waiting non-too patiently for someone to explain what the hell was going on.

General Landry finally arrived and passed John a thick looking envelope and had a CD at the top of his own pile. He watched as John shuffled the pages more out of politeness than anything else and then look up at him expectantly.

"As you may or may not know, we received no word from the Atlantis mission after their departure." Landry said, watching John carefully, probably looking for any indication that he was already aware of this. John gave no indication one way or the other.

"Anyway, three days ago we received a compressed data burst from them. It explained how they were able to dial Earth only for a period of 3.3 seconds, most of the research and discoveries they had made and also some rather disturbing news. Apparently in the Pegasus Galaxy we may have found a new enemy, worse than the Goa'uld." Landry explained.

John waved a hand, urging Landry to elaborate. Landry simply shrugged and moved forward, slipping the CD into the player under the television set up in the room. "There were also a number of messages for loved ones. Each person was only allowed a few moments to say what they wanted and it seems Doctor Weir sacrificed her time..." Landry shrugged and waved a hand at the screen. "Well, you'll see."

The screen flickered and a fuzzy image showed which resolved itself into the shape of Doctor Elizabeth Weir. John sat forward, noting how she'd changed. Her hair looked to have been sheared short, like she had had to cut it in a hurry. Her uniform looked like a strange mix of military uniform and something tribal and there was a long scar that curled from her temple to her jaw on the right side. He noticed this last thing when she turned her head slightly and looked at someone off screen.

"Now, Rodney?" She asked and must have gotten an unheard ascent, because she took a breath and began.

"This is Doctor Elizabeth Weir. We're currently under siege by a Hive ship. We found a partially depleted ZPM on a planet in the Ancient database designated P4X-2274 and we have been maintaining shields but Doctor McKay estimates we can only hold out for another six weeks, at the most. We've had to seal off gate access as we were being bombarded from both the air and through the Stargate. We are risking dialing out to Earth and depleting our ZPM to ask for help."

She paused then and John realised that both his hands had balled into fists so hard that his nails had dug bloody half moons into his palms. He relaxed them with an effort.

"We need help."

Elizabeth looked down for a moment and her mouth firmed, as if she had been tossing up whether to say what came next and had only just decided.

"We need Major John Sheppard if at all possible. We have others here that have the Ancient gene but Rodney tells me that no one has as natural affinity for the technology as Major Sheppard displayed while we were in Antarctica. We just... we need him."

The message cut out and John sat back with an exhalation, only realising he had been holding his breath when he did. "You can see why-"

"I'll go." John said and Landry blinked at him.

"You don't even-"

"Look, you wouldn't have me here if there _wasn't_ a way to get to them. Spare me the hard sell. I'll go."

Landry harrumphed and stood, looking like he'd had a whole spiel ready and was disappointed that he hadn't gotten to say it.

"The Deadelus leaves in two days. You pass the physical and I'll get you on it."

"Good." John said, his voice hollow.

It seemed that he was destined to follow Elizabeth anyway.


	3. End

They stand together, at the balcony overlooking the Stargate and watch their people evacuate. The ZPM was enough for them to be able to make the trip back to Earth, carrying the horrors they had witnessed with them.

The underlying background steady thrum of multiple Wraith weapons hitting the shields, that will only protect them for a few more precious hours, underpins everything.

They stand shoulder to shoulder. If even one of them moves only half an inch their shoulders would touch, arms pressed together.

Neither of them move.

Both of them want to.

He looks at her every now and again, but out of the corner of his eye.

The bombardment had started straight after they had dropped out of hyperspace.

Despite the risks the Atlantis residents had taken to warn Earth of the danger the Wraith presented, the military had taken the position that their shiny new ship could take anything thrown at it. John wondered if they'd learned nothing from the Goa'uld Actually, he wondered more if the Goa'uld had made the humans complacent. There had been those that had been fighting the Goa'uld for hundreds if not thousands of years and yet the Tau'ri stepped in and their whole system was destabilized in nine.

They credited their military prowess but John knew that it was more the Goa'uld's complacency and arrogance that had been their undoing. They had died the death of a thousand cuts, not noticing the damage until it was too late.

It seemed that two more Hive ships had turned up between the message sent out and the Deadalus' departure and they hadn't stood a chance. The Deadalus limped across the threshold between shielded space and non-shielded and shuddered to a halt.

Her crew knew she would never make it back into the sky.

There'd been relief that a functioning ZPM was brought, but disappointment that the Earth's great ship had been so easily defeated. The last of the hope that the Atlantis explorers had been holding onto had vanished.

"That's the last of them." Doctor Weir says with finality, her voice carefully neutral, like she is reporting a fact. John can tell after only the short time of knowing her that this evacuation is tearing her apart. She would see it as a personal failure, no matter what the circumstance.

"Self-destruct set?" John asks, more for something to say than from any doubt that it had been done.

"Rod… Doctor McKay set it this morning. We just have to press a button." 

"Turn off the stove and switch off the lights." John sighs.

"I'm sorry you came." Elizabeth says and John looks at her and sees the tightness around her eyes that indicates she's said something and it hasn't come out like intended. "What I mean is-"

"I know." He says softly. "Seems like a waste. I didn't do anything."

He hears an exhalation of breath, the minutest pause. "You came." Elizabeth's voice is barely above a whisper and has a note of wonder in it. She finally turns to him and he can see in her face a fine etching of regret.

_Another time, another place…_

"We're ready." The scientist, a Canadian that John can tell Elizabeth holds in high regard and with a great deal of affection and patience bustles up behind them, laptop in hand and a pack slung over his shoulder.

"Good. You go through. We'll be right behind you." Elizabeth nods and Doctor McKay pauses for only a second, before nodding and making his way down the stairs and to the 'gate.

Three minutes later and they are standing on either side of the main console, hands hovering over the trigger mechanisms Rodney had built to start the self-destruct. "Oh, wait!" Elizabeth exclaims and ducks into her office. John watches her hunt around before she emerges and can't help the bark of laughter when he sees the bottle of whisky and the two glasses.

"I was keeping this for a special occasion." Elizabeth says, waggling the bottle.

Only when each has a glass in hand does Elizabeth give the nod.


End file.
